Actually some anticoagulant poisons stay in the body for up to 2-4 weeks. And the way they work, they don't do permanent damage. As long as they are in the system in an active form they interfere with blood clotting, but once they are out of the system they are no longer a danger (unless the dog has bled enough in the meantime to be life threatening). That's why if you know what happened in time, this type of poisoning is actually quite treatable (with anticoagulant rat/mouse poisons only, there are others that have no treatment).

Also, a necropsy may have shown if there was another cause for the bleeding. IME, while not impossible, vomiting blood is pretty uncommon with this type of poisoning. Usually dogs bleed into their lungs or abdomen, or have extensive bruising on the skin.

And on a bit of a tangent but a somewhat relevant FYI, last year the EPA in its infinite wisdom banned most of the anticoagulant mouse/rat poisons for commercial sale (except through certain venues). Meaning that now most if not all of the poisons that most of us can purchase easily are in a class of bad, bad juju neurotoxins that will kill you dead without any hope for an antidote or treatment other than trying to purge it ASAP.

And on a bit of a tangent but a somewhat relevant FYI, last year the EPA in its infinite wisdom banned most of the anticoagulant mouse/rat poisons for commercial sale (except through certain venues). Meaning that now most if not all of the poisons that most of us can purchase easily are in a class of bad, bad juju neurotoxins that will kill you dead without any hope for an antidote or treatment other than trying to purge it ASAP.

Yay EPA!

Yeah I've heard that. When we did have rat poison down (Which was a lengthy discussion because we really didn't want to), it was ONLY in the basement and the cat was NOT allowed down there and the dog was only down there on a leash.

It was several years ago now (2004 maybe?), but we successfully treated our grey dog for what we suspect was rat poisoning (Only had a little on the property and it was in a locked shed so not sure how the dog would have gotten to it) with vit. K. Lots and lots of vit. K.

But, those are off topic. I feel so sorry for the dog owners, handlers, etc. that had to lose a dear friend that way. I've lost beloved pets to what we believe was poisoning from a neighbor, so I can totally understand their anger.

Actually some anticoagulant poisons stay in the body for up to 2-4 weeks. And the way they work, they don't do permanent damage. As long as they are in the system in an active form they interfere with blood clotting, but once they are out of the system they are no longer a danger (unless the dog has bled enough in the meantime to be life threatening). That's why if you know what happened in time, this type of poisoning is actually quite treatable (with anticoagulant rat/mouse poisons only, there are others that have no treatment).

Also, a necropsy may have shown if there was another cause for the bleeding. IME, while not impossible, vomiting blood is pretty uncommon with this type of poisoning. Usually dogs bleed into their lungs or abdomen, or have extensive bruising on the skin.

Strider ate a box of mouse poison when he was about a year old. It was basically just warfarin. Anyway, when we realized it and rushed him to an e-vet it had already been 12-20 hours.

They gave him tons of vitamin K shots, sent me home with oral vit K, and did a sack of liquid charcoal just in case there was any residue in his digestive system.

The vet said that he had already started bleeding into the pericardial sack, and that if we had gotten him in any later he would had keeled over dead for no apparent reason. That was scary. I'm glad we knew that he'd gotten into the poison or we would have lost him. She made it sound like after a couple of days the dog is pretty well doomed, unless maybe they can do a bunch of blood transfusions or something. I don't know what the treatment would be at that stage.

Strider ate a box of mouse poison when he was about a year old. It was basically just warfarin. Anyway, when we realized it and rushed him to an e-vet it had already been 12-20 hours.

They gave him tons of vitamin K shots, sent me home with oral vit K, and did a sack of liquid charcoal just in case there was any residue in his digestive system.

The vet said that he had already started bleeding into the pericardial sack, and that if we had gotten him in any later he would had keeled over dead for no apparent reason. That was scary. I'm glad we knew that he'd gotten into the poison or we would have lost him. She made it sound like after a couple of days the dog is pretty well doomed, unless maybe they can do a bunch of blood transfusions or something. I don't know what the treatment would be at that stage.

There are a bunch of different specific anticoagulants that can be used as mouse/rat poison, and they all have slightly different characteristics in terms of how fast they cause problems and how long they last in the body. The longest acting ones stay in the body up to 30 days - they can still be treated with vitamin K, you just have to give vitamin K that whole time. The shortest acting ones stay in the body for I think just a few days (can't remember off the top of my head).

Most of the time people call as soon as they realize it happened and the dogs get treated before they ever show any signs. But if they don't call right away... the longest I've ever seen between a dog eating it and showing symptoms was 10 days (the owner knew the dog ate it but apparently didn't realize it was poisonous to dogs until it was in pretty serious shape - although happily the dog ultimately lived). The shortest was maybe 2-3 days. It seems like it's usually about 5-7 days.

Anyway, with the new ban last year rat/mouse poison is becoming a whole different ball game. /tangent